It certainly could not have been thrown into a strategy,

 It certainly could not have been thrown into a strategy,

” Williams says with a laugh as she admits to the band’s tumultuous journey, which includes a six-year gap following its previous album, “After Laughter” (2017).“We just got very lucky that people still care about our music after all this time,” she says. “For any band, even without the time off, that’s a big deal.”

“This Is Why” marks the first time in the history of Paramore — which now features Williams, 34; York, 33; and drummer Zac Farro, 32 — that it has maintained the same lineup from one album to the next.It’s a bold, innovative step forward for the trio. Sonically, the band embraces several genres throughout the 10 tracks. The album’s heavy closer, “Thick Skull,” is all shoegaze drone; “C’est Comme Ca” is a post-punk, spoken word track; and the frantic, upbeat title track is guitar-anchored.

Paramore has also evolved in how it operates as a unit.“Communication has become a huge thing for us now,” Farro says. “When you’re young, you just feel like, ‘Oh, I won’t say anything and it’ll go away.’ But when it doesn’t, it just builds into this big mud pile of bad energy.”